


A Funeral and a Wedding

by justalittlegreen



Series: Sunshine and Filth [36]
Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Anal, Funeral, Grief Sex, Minor Character Death, Multi, OT3, Sailing, Wedding, my wife's only 5'1, ottumwa, planes are hard for hawk, punnihawk, the smut is only in the very last chapter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-25
Updated: 2019-02-27
Packaged: 2019-11-05 09:29:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 9,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17916224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justalittlegreen/pseuds/justalittlegreen
Summary: Daniel Pierce's death brings possibilities to light amid Hawkeye's grief.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nowhiteflaguponmydoor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nowhiteflaguponmydoor/gifts), [docmccoy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/docmccoy/gifts), [pr0serpina](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pr0serpina/gifts).



Peg takes the two crayon-scrawled cards and slips them into the matching suitcases before bringing them to the front door. BJ comes out of the bathroom, hair damp and combed, in his second-best suit. He takes his suitcase with a thankful nod, then sets it down, pulling her into his arms.   
  
"I wish you were coming," he says for the eightieth time. "Daniel loved you."   
  
"I loved him, too," she says. "You'll have to get photos to bring back with you. We can put them up. It'll help."    
  
He nods against the top of her head as they hear the back door open.    
  
"Beej? The car's ready." Hawkeye comes in, and Peg pulls away from BJ, reaching up to take Hawkeye's face in her hands.    
  
"Don't, Peg," he whispers, voice thick. "Don't, or I'll fall apart right now." She nods, pulls her hands down. He bends down for a long, soft kiss, drops one more on her head and says, "That's for Erin when she wakes up."   
  
The cab drives off with them into the early San Francisco morning. They'll call tonight from Boston, and then once they reach Maine. She'll put Erin on the phone to help them keep it together. And when they return, they'll pull Hawkeye between them and hold him as he finally lets go.

 

When Hawkeye heads to the airport bar without a word, BJ doesn't stop him. He pulls up a stool next to Hawk and orders a club soda with orange juice while Hawk knocks back a shot of scotch without tasting it. He orders another right away.    
  
"Hawk? If you're trying to make sure you keep your composure, this probably isn't the best way to go about it," he says quietly when the bartender is at the other end of the bar.   
  
"This isn't about that," Hawk replies, tilting the second glass in his fingers. "You've never flown with me. This is purely medicinal." He takes a sip and puts the glass down, rattling it slightly against the counter.   
  
"Ah." There's no denying that Hawk's drinking is far more under control than it was at the end of the war, but BJ's guard still goes up when Hawk's had more than a few drinks in hand. "How many?"   
  
He shrugs. "How much time do we have?"   
  
"Twenty minutes."    
  
Hawk nods. "I've never flown with someone. I mean, someone I know. Someone I can -"   
  
" - lean on?"   
  
"Mmm."   
  
"Hawk?"   
  
"Mmm?"   
  
"I'll be there the whole time.  The  _ whole _ time."   
  
And then Hawkeye does something BJ's never seen him do before. He puts his glass down, still a quarter full, and lets BJ lead him out.   
  
He falls asleep on BJ's shoulder on the plane. BJ reads the early Chronicle and makes notes on Hawk's draft of the eulogy. He's not the writer - or the speaker - Hawk can be, but he knows Hawkeye won't accept it unless he makes some corrections and improvements. Luckily, there's two spelling mistakes.

Hawk sleeps until somewhere over Iowa. The stewardess comes by and offers them drinks, and before Hawkeye can order another scotch, BJ asks for water. She gives them a whole bottle.   
  
"Don't forget, you'll dehydrate faster up here. The booze'll hit you harder."   
  
"I think that's the reward for having to sit in one of these things for six hours." Hawkeye jiggles his leg, drums his fingers on the armrest.    
  
"Here. I brought you something," BJ says, pulling a new book out of the seat pocket, receipt still tucked into its pages. "I thought we might finally figure out how it ends."   
  
Hawk takes the paperback and turns it over in his hands. For the first time in days, he cracks a smile that reaches his eyes. " _ The Rooster Crowed at Midnight _ ," he says, voice full of awe. "Beej, where did you find this?"   
  
"Little place in the city that opened a few years ago. I've been saving it for you. I figured it'd be a good birthday present, but..."   
  
"I could kiss you right now." His whisper is so soft BJ wonders if he said it at all.


	2. Chapter 2

It's one of the first days of spring that doesn't feel raw and ragged, where everything is shoots and sprouts and buds. BJ arrives at the church with the rest of the guests; Hawkeye's been with the minister for an hour. He takes a seat a few rows behind the front, fixes his eyes on the curl at the nape of Hawk's neck. He's sandwiched between two aunts, a head taller than both.

BJ whistles softly, a two-note call he knows Hawk can hear underneath the echoing chatter of the arriving guests. Hawk whips his head around, catches BJ's eye, gives him a brave smile. BJ wishes he could grow arms long enough to hold him over the rows. He settles for a wink in lieu of a blown kiss. 

The funeral is small-town life at its finest; everyone has a story about the good country doctor, most of them funny and touching. The minister's speech is heartfelt; Daniel wasn't a heavy churchgoer, but came often enough to be known. One of the local kids - a patient since her birth - plays “Amazing Grace” on her flute, and BJ closes his eyes, letting the notes drift over him.

Afterwards, from the other side of the room, BJ watches Hawk for signs of impending meltdown, but he quickly realizes he doesn't need to worry. The nerves fade to fascination as he watches the vestiges and memories of Hawkeye's childhood come home to hold him. He catches him laughing - truly laughing - once or twice, sees him hug men his age, men he grew up with, who've brought their wives - some of whom he also grew up with.

His home now may be California, but this will always be the place that grew him. And BJ is grateful to get to see it.

They sit on the porch at Daniel's house, the bottle of Daniel's best scotch between them. The sun is setting over the woods, and Hawkeye rocks back in his chair, tilting his head into the remaining rays of sun as he sips. 

"It was a nice service," BJ says for the tenth time that day. 

"Mmm," Hawk says. "Do you think the eulogy was too long?"

"It was perfect."

"Yeah, I thought so, too."

"He'd have loved it. Just enough laughs, just enough tears. Simple. Clean."

"The appendectomy of eulogies."

"Exactly."

"Er, Hawk?"

"Yeah?"

"I feel funny asking, but where do you want me to sleep tonight?"

"You mean since my room has a bed the size of an army cot, and we don't need to pretend you sleep on the couch anymore?"

"I can if you want me to," he says quickly, worrying he's overstepped.

"No, it's okay. The aunts came by this morning and took - " he takes a shaky breath - "took a lot of things out. Pills and dirty linens and things. They made up the bed."

"I can understand how that would be too - "

"Beej, relax. I need to actually sleep tonight. It's better if you're with me."

BJ nods, then brings up something else that's been on his mind. "Are we going...to have dinner? Or is this - " he raises his glass "the only thing on the menu?"

Hawk chuckles. "Don't worry. The casserole brigade starts in an hour and won't let up until three weeks after we're gone."

BJ calls as they're getting packed to leave; he tells her things are fine.

"Hawkeye's not drinking too much, is he?"

"Actually, he's not. We were enjoying some of Daniel's good scotch last night and he was actually sipping it."

"Did he sleep?"

"Not like a rock, exactly, but a good four or five hours."

"Were you on the couch again?"

"Actually, we slept on Daniel's bed. It was a little strange, but at least it was big enough for the both of us...we had to get up before the first of the neighbors arrived for breakfast, though."

"Darling, are you sure he's all right? Are you?"

"I'm sure, Peg. It's hard to put into words, but he's home, here. It's different than with us, but these people love him. They accept him and look up to him. And he's - I don't know, less charming here. Not that he's not lovable, but it's less of an act. Less of The Hawkeye Vaudeville Hour. It's nice. Makes me wonder if he really needed me to come, to be honest."

"Of course he did. Don't be silly."

"And what about you? I miss you."

"I miss you too, sweetheart. We're fine. Going to go up to the house today. Barbara's coming - she said she'd watch Erin for a few hours."

"Going to get some time on the boat?"

"If the wind's in my sails."

"Don't you know I'm always the wind in your sails?"

"Fat lot of good the wind's doing me across the country."

"Don't let it deflate you."

He hears the smile in her voice as she says, "BJ Hunnicutt, that was a terrible pun."

"I'll take my punishment like a man, then. Here, Hawkeye wants to say hi. I love you."

"Love you, too."

"Peggy Jane?"

"Hi darling. How are you holding up?"

"I'm okay, actually. I mean, it's terrible and there's a part of me that will feel like I've delivered a flawless performance of Hamlet to an empty theater over and over again for the rest of my life. But I'm okay."

"It was like that when my father died, too. The theater fills up again, Hawkeye. There will always be an empty seat, but you won't be alone, either."

There's a long silence on his end; she thinks she might have lost him. "Hawkeye?"

His voice shakes. "Then why does it feel like that empty seat is the only one I'll ever be looking for?"

It hits her, too. The tears come, hot and sudden; it hasn't been but a year since her Pa, and though she wasn't half as close to him as Hawkeye was to Daniel, it aches. "I don't know, darling," she says, sniffling. "I just know that mine's the seat next to it. And someday you'll look elsewhere, and it won't hurt this much."


	3. Chapter 3

Peg raises the sail and shoves off the dock in the skiff, aiming herself into the wind on an angle that should carry her far enough out to feel alone. Barbara's on the beach with Erin, patiently following her and keeping her from eating too much sand. The breeze, the sun, the salt - it's why she moved to California, why she spent fourteen months living just off the beach in LA. She had dreams of the ocean from the time she was a little girl, which was ridiculous for a born-and-bred Okie. But it called, endless and blue.

She learned to sail from the library; from looking at diagrams of ships, even teaching herself the watch schedules of old cargo ships, pretending to tell time with bells. When she got to LA, she searched until she found a place she could rent a sailboat, stuck her nose in the air at the boy in the rental shop who smirked at her like she couldn't possibly know what she was doing.

Four hours later, she pushed the boat to shore from a hundred yards away, having capsized it within minutes, the rigging a hopeless mess of knots. The boy with the smirk watched her from the dock, and by the time she made it back, he stuck his hand out to help her up with a look of sympathetic respect.

"I'm thinking I could use a lesson," she said with every ounce of dignity she could muster.

"I'm thinking I could trade you one," he said.

She gave him a wary look. 

"Not like that," he said quickly, blushing halfway down his neck. "My boss doesn't like me giving lessons on his watch, so I tell him I'm just showing a few tricks to a friend. A friend who buys me five or six hamburgers afterward."

She grinned. "I think half a dozen hamburgers is worth learning how not to drown," she'd said. 

A week later, she was out on her own again, this time with balance and confidence, the tiller easy under her hand.

Sailing, to her, felt the way some kids felt about driving a car - free, limitless, all the possibilities stretched before her leading to the horizon. She learned that she could sail for an hour or so, until her mind was completely clear, all the worries and mental lists falling into the waves to sink. Once she reached that point, she could drop anchor and ask herself one single, important question, and the answer would appear - no matter how much she'd been sweating it, the right thing would make itself known on the water.

Four months before he asked her, Peggy sailed into the San Francisco Bay in a rented skiff until she found the courage to ask herself if she wanted to marry BJ. At the moment she asked the question, the sun broke through the silver-gray sky, and she found herself laughing. "You win!" she shouted at the waves. "Alright - you win."

Now she speeds along the waves, leaning and rocking with the boat without thinking, anticipating the impact of each swell on the delicate balance of sail and body. The sun is out in all its glory, and everyone's fathers are dead.

All three of them, and one living parent among them.

It isn't normal. Not that anything about them is, but this - it's eerie. BJ doesn't often talk about his folks, except in tight-grinned quips that never quite land right. His father was gone before she met him, and she met his mother twice - once was at their wedding. She seemed civil and pleasant enough, but BJ was always on alert round her. If he'd been a dog, he'd have gone wide-eyed, ears pinned back, tail stiffly tucked. Wary, nervous.

Almost no one in the world made him look like that.

When the news of his mother's death reached them - a full two days after she passed - he'd gone up to make the arrangements, to settle the estate. Peggy had walked with him through his childhood home, in her fourth month pregnant, and while he paused to show her the sites of a few happy memories - a wall of pencil marks where he'd been measured every year, a framed photo of him on a horse in the desert, the speckled blue coffeepot he took with him that reminded him of good times - he looked at most of the house as if it belonged to someone else.

Peggy had helped him clean it out, worked with the realtor to get it ready to sell. It was her first glimpse at how a house could change a person. When they talked about her going back to work after Erin was older, she told him she wanted to sell houses.

The wind calms, and she slows the skiff until she's bobbing on the waves. She doesn't know what question she wants to ask, only the insistent compulsion to get out on the water. She trails her hand in the salty murk and waits.

The words take awhile to find their way, but she can see the shape of it, feel the ache of it in her chest.

Who is his anchor now? And who will be yours?

Daniel Pierce's face emerges in her mind, and for the first time since she got the news, Peggy puts her face in her hands and sobs.


	4. Chapter 4

Hawkeye only needs one glass of gin before getting on the plane this time. He wedges himself against the window with a pillow and subtly hooks his ankle around BJ's. This time, he wakes up close to the end of the flight, just as the lights on the Bay are coming into view. The stewardess offers them hot towels and fresh drinks, which they gratefully take. BJ scrubs at his face, feeling a layer of recycled-air grime come off.

Peg is slated to pick them up at the airport with Erin, and BJ is eager to see them, eager to get back to the business of their lives and their living. As they're waiting for the other passengers to move off the plane, Hawk leans close to his ear and whispers, "Beej? Is Peg going to be - "

He nods before Hawk finishes the question. "Yup. Erin, too."

"Beej?"

He cocks his head in reply - I'm listening.

"Can I be - ?" and he nods again, emphatically, wishing he could reach back and give Hawk's hand a squeeze. 

"Of course," he murmurs as the lines starts to move.

He sees Peg before she sees him, scanning the line of people coming off the plane, Erin in her arms. BJ sidles back, lets Hawk step in front of him. Hawkeye's step quickens as he spots them, and then their eyes meet, and he's speeding up even more, half running to them and sweeping Peg and Erin into one hug. He kisses Peg like he's coming home from war.

BJ, behind him, winks at her, and she winks back at him over Hawk's shoulder.

BJ's not used to playing the role of loving uncle very often, but there are times when it's more than worth the slight twinge in his guts. Hawkeye puts his arm around Peg and steers them down the concourse, BJ falling into step at his side. Peg passes him Erin, who he tosses into the air so she'll shriek wordlessly instead of shouting "Daddy" for all the world to hear.  
It's seamless, choreographed, and almost - almost - second nature.

By the nature of the agreement, Hawkeye getting to be the public husband means BJ gets a few minutes alone with Peg when they get home. Hawkeye takes Erin into her room and pulls out a stuffed monkey from his childhood he brought back to introduce to her. Peggy stands on the second step of the staircase so she can look him straight in the eye. Her kiss is long and sure, arms firm around him, and he finds himself melting slightly, leaning into her the way she so often leans into him.

"How was it, really?" she asks as soon as they've properly welcomed each other back. He shakes his head, raising a rueful eyebrow. 

"Good. Terrible. Lovely. Hollow."

"In other words, a funeral." 

"Couldn't have said it better."

"Is he all right?"

"More than I expected. We'll see what happens tonight." She nods, and pulls him close again. Erin comes tearing out of the bedroom, waving the monkey and hollering. Hawkeye follows behind her, shrugging apologetically. 

"Do I need to take her somewhere, or - "

"We're fine," Peg says quickly. "We'll have more time to catch up later. Dinner's on the stove - we're having meatloaf."

Hawkeye hoists Erin onto his back and gallops toward the kitchen, chanting "meatloaf, meatloaf, meatloaf," in a singsong voice until Erin joins in. 

Dinner is quick. Peg is delighted to see that Hawkeye's eating, really eating, and that he seems so much less empty than when he left. Exhausted, yes. But somehow both lighter and fuller.

The rush to put Erin to bed picks up after they've all eaten. Hawkeye goes up to take a shower and BJ gets Erin into her little pajamas, which is a full-blown exercise in chasing her around the room while she's got one pant leg on and her shirt pulled over her face. By the time Peg finishes the dishes, he's got her in his arms, rocking and singing round after round of “You Are My Sunshine” as she finally starts to calm. 

"Goodnight room," Peg begins from the doorway.

"Goodnight moon," Erin answers around her thumb from BJ's shoulder.

"Goodnight, cow jumping over the moon," BJ continues.

"Goodnight light,"

"...and the red balloon," says Hawkeye coming down the hallway in his bathrobe, rubbing his hair dry with a towel.

They go round and round until they finish the story. Erin collects three sets of kisses and contentedly sticks Hawkeye's monkey under one arm and her ducky under the other.


	5. Chapter 5

“Peg," Hawkeye says softly once they've closed the door, "Come to the living room - I've got something for you."

Instead of settling in their usual places, they come together on the couch, Peg between them. Hawkeye opens his suitcase and pulls out a long, narrow box that rattles a bit as he digs it out from under the shirts.

"My father said once," he explains, "that without any daughters, my mother wanted - " he stops for a second, voice rising. He clears his throat and continues. "She wanted me to keep these for my wife, someday. I know my father loved you, Peggy. He did. But he never quite - accepted, I think, who we were to one another. We never spoke of it. I never had the courage to ask him for what was rightfully yours - by my mother's own words."

She's tearing up as he talks, all heartache and the barbed balm of memory. It was true that Daniel had never completely understood them. He hosted them with a natural grace and graciousness that she always appreciated, and he treated Erin like a beloved grandchild, even starting a bank account for her on her sixth birthday, six months ago, per Pierce family tradition. But they had always slept separately - she and BJ refused to share a bed in solidarity, and so BJ always took the couch, and Peg slept on a cot in the room with Erin. Something about it didn't sit right with Daniel, and they respected his hesitation, mostly because he respected their existence.

Hawkeye hands her the box and motioned her to open it. Peg sniffs and wiped her tears on the back of her hand before untying the string that held the worn cardboard box together.

Inside is a small tangle of gold and silver, flashes of color and pearls. "Oh no," Hawkeye said, a little distraught, "they were all neat when I put them in. Shit, Peg, I'm sorry, let me - "

She puts a hand over his. "It's okay. I've got this. BJ, can I borrow one of your needles?" BJ retrieves an embroidery needle, large and sturdy, and she uses it to start teasing out the individual pieces.

The first to emerge is a ring: a simple yellow gold band, far too big for Peg. "Sorry," Hawkeye says, reaching for it. "That one was his."

"Can I see?" she asks, holding it up to the light. He withdraws his hand and nods. She turns the ring over a few times, the flicker of an idea forming in her head.

"It's beautiful," she says. "But it could use a little cleaning. Would you mind if I hung on to it and gave it back?"

"Of course," he says, and she knows - she knows he's imagining his father's fingers, the way the ring rested easy against his skin.

She turns her attention back to the mess of delicate chains, and, with the needle, teases out a small gold necklace with an emerald pendant the size of her pinky nail. She spreads it over her palm, admiring the rich green. "Do you remember her wearing this?"

"I do," he breathes. BJ reaches around her to put a hand on his back. 

"It's beautiful. I bet she looked lovely in it." 

Hawkeye sniffles and wipes his eyes. "Would you try it on?"  
She undoes the clasp and holds the ends to BJ. You'll never have to worry about buttoning your dress up the back, her mother had said about her marrying a surgeon, but it's mostly the clasps she needs help with. BJ deftly fastens it around her neck, and she turns to Hawkeye for inspection. 

Hawkeye puts a hand to his mouth. It fits her perfectly, the bright green stone resting just below her clavicle. "Let me get you a mirror," he whispers, rushing to the bathroom. 

It does suit her - simple, elegant, not at all showy. She loves it, and, in a moment, feels a warm trickling of connection with a woman she never knew. "Hawkeye, I don't think I'll ever take it off," she says.

"I don't think I want you to," he says. 

"It looks like it was made for you," BJ agrees.

But she does take it off, because there are more pieces - a strand of pearls that will go beautifully with the ones she wears on nice evenings out; a silver ring with a red, earthy stone set in it, a silver necklace that's too long and heavy for her, but might be good for Erin someday. BJ brings her jewelry box and Peg carefully finds a place for each new piece.

Finally, there's only one thing left.

"Her engagement ring?" Peg guesses. Hawkeye nods, eyes dry now. 

"She hardly ever wore it," he explains. "We buried her in her wedding ring, but I wish I had it. It's why I took my father's. He'd want - he wouldn't want it buried forever, out of sight."

She looks it over. A thin band, in yellow gold. A modest diamond, imperfect and small. Exactly the sort of ring BJ would have gotten her if he hadn't had his grandmother's to pass on. Exactly the sort of thing a young doctor could afford for his bride-to-be. 

She looks at her own engagement and wedding rings, the large diamond offset by the two smaller ones on the silver band, and the wedding band, which has small diamonds all around it. They look gorgeous together. She loves carrying that with her, the solidity of another woman's hands and marriage guiding her own.

She doesn't dare put it on. Instead she presses a finger to the diamond, wiggling it back and forth. "The stone's just a bit loose," she says. "I could take it to the jeweler and have it tightened." 

"I guess, if it's important," Hawkeye says, uncertain. 

"Well, even if you just want to keep it, it's important to keep it in good shape," Peg says. "I'll take it with the wedding band and we'll see how they look in a few days, ok?"

He nods. 

"Hawkeye - I don't know how to thank you. These must mean so much to you."

"It means more to see you wear it," he says, gesturing to the necklace. "I don't expect you'll want to wear them all, but I know - my mother would have loved you. She'd have wanted you to have these, you know?" He chokes up before he can get more words out, and BJ pulls a handkerchief out of his pocket to pass to him. Hawkeye rests his elbows on his knees and cries, soft sobs and long, shuddering breaths. Peg rests a hand on his back, remembering - how it hit her, how she seemed to have a 'cry' button somewhere in her chest that would get pushed by likely and unlikely things. How it was a reflex, like sneezing, in the early days.

Hawkeye sits up a minute later, wipes his face, and folds the cloth before tucking it in his shirt pocket. "Is anyone ready for bed?"

BJ gets to his feet and holds out his arms. Hawkeye melts into him, sagging against BJ's chest. He kisses Hawkeye's head and rubs his back, rocking back and forth on his feet for a moment. Peg stands on tiptoes to kiss his cheek, and slowly, they all head upstairs.

He doesn't ask about the rings after a week goes by - too distracted, she guesses, or maybe he thinks she forgot. In truth, she'd gone out the very next day to the jeweler, who had polished Daniel's band to a new shine in a few seconds, and who had taken merely a day to clean and reset Adelaide's engagement ring. It looked a good deal better - prouder, somehow, more dignified in its shine.

She has them tucked in her bureau, using an old trick of her mother's - balling them up in a pair of distinctively chunky knitted socks. The idea that sparked when she opened the box has grown into a soft glow that keeps her warm all the time.

Hawkeye's grief takes on different dimensions; he goes back to work a few days after they return, and at first, it's a good distraction for him - he comes home excited and happy to have a scalpel in hand again, taking easy cases. BJ pretends not to be keeping as close an eye on him as he is. Hawkeye stays up late working on the estate paperwork, reading glasses perched on his nose. He still breaks into tears at unexpected moments, but he isn't drinking much more than usual, and he isn't pulling away from Erin. 

(He thinks Peg doesn't notice, but Erin is his canary when he goes to the coal mine - if he starts to withdraw from playing with her, or putting her to bed, something's wrong. Sometimes she catches it before he even realizes.)

Their lovemaking comes back to its usual pace, balanced between the business of parenting and working. Hawkeye sometimes still pauses or cries when they're together; sometimes they stop, and sometimes they just keep going until they're through. There is lots of time with Hawkeye nestled between them, wordless and tender, all of them running their hands over each others' skin, grateful for each other. Grateful to be alive and here.

 

Peg writes to Ottumwa, telling Joan about her plan, and Joanie writes back Yes. We'll leave the kids with the neighbors, and Walt won't love it, but of course we'll be there.

She sits them down two weeks out, in the living room, tells them, "I've been thinking. About Daniel, and how we always slept apart. About how we didn't touch much, didn't do anything to disturb him. How we were quiet."

Hawkeye looks like he's not sure whether he wants to leap to his father's defense or agree with her. BJ waits for her to get closer to her point.

"And...and I didn't like that. I understood it, and I respected it. But I didn't like it." 

"I don't think any of us did," Hawkeye says with just a hint of protest in his voice. 

"I know you didn't," she reassures him. "I'm not saying I regret anything, either. It was what we did. It kept things peaceful. He was never going to understand."

"But he tried," BJ jumps in. "You have to give him credit - "

"Listen!" she interrupts. "I'm done. I'm done being quiet. I want to be with both of you and I don't want to hide."

BJ looks at her like she's crazy. Hawkeye goes pale. 

"Now that I've got your attention," she continues, "I'm not suggesting we hang a banner on the porch that announces us to the world. But I want something. Something that feels real. That feels like being seen."

Some of the color comes back to Hawkeye's face, and they both nod. "What do you have in mind?" BJ asks.

"I've invited the O'Reilly's - just Walt and Joan, not the kids - to the beach house in two weeks. And I want to get married."

"You want to what?" they ask in unison.

"You heard me."

Hawkeye bursts into tears. Peg cocks her head to him, listening, like she did when Erin was small, to see if it was a cry to move on from, or a cry to stop for. After a moment, she goes to him and kneels at his feet, takes his hands in hers.

She kisses their bundled hands, then moves over so she has one hand clasped in BJ's and one in Hawkeye's, her kneeling between them. "Hawkeye Pierce..."she begins with an unsteady solemnity. 

"Wait!" he yelps. "Wait, no, this is all wrong. You're not supposed to be the one on your knees!"

She laughs, and the tears come, and suddenly they're all crying, together, and BJ is saying "Yes," and Hawkeye is saying "Yes," and Peg is saying "Yes," and none of them know what it means or what it looks like except that it means something.


	6. Chapter 6

The night before Walt and Joan arrive, the three of them head up to Stinson Beach to prepare. Peg's insisted that they observe the custom of not seeing each other the night before, which they symbolically limit to sleeping in separate bedrooms, with Hawkeye bunking in Erin's room on a cot. 

"We should've finished the cottage before we did this," he grouses, digging a blanket out of the linen closet. 

"I'm not the one who decided we should start framing things in October!” Peg calls from the next room. 

As she climbs into the big bed (BJ's in the guest room), Peg's surprised that she doesn't feel the same flutters she had the night before she married BJ. Instead, she's lonely, missing the warmth and sounds of them. Wishing she could have them.

That's the point, she tells herself. Tomorrow, you'll climb into bed with them and it will feel that much sweeter.

She opens the bedside table drawer to check again that she's got what she needs for tomorrow and, satisfied, slips a hand down the front of her pajamas. She's got to take the edge off or she'll never get to sleep.

In Erin's room, Hawkeye curses the short straw and tries to get comfortable on the cot. His body hasn't gotten any more suited for this in the years since the war. He reaches under the bed and lays his hand on his contribution to the proceedings: his father's Bible, with the Hippocratic Oath scripted neatly into the inside of the front cover. His father's - and his - only holy text.

BJ is already half asleep, clutching the extra pillow to his chest. He's never admitted it to Peg or Hawkeye - never had to - but he hates his arms being empty at night.


	7. Chapter 7

BJ and Hawkeye leave the house before Peg wakes up, in their separate cars, heading to town to kill time until noon. Peggy walks into the kitchen stark naked, pours herself some coffee (it must've been BJ who made it - no, Hawkeye. He took a cup for himself and left her the balance of the pot) and settles on the couch, wrapped in her granny's afghan as the sun comes up over the water.

She spends the morning in a long bath (which one of them brought the good salts? Must've been BJ,) ironing her dress (so it's not white; a blush pink is more honest, anyway) and fixing the platter of roast beef sandwiches and salads for later. She's in her bathrobe and slip with her hair in curlers when she hears the Oldsmobile's horn in the driveway. 

"It's just us!" Joan calls coming in. "BJ said he would go around the back and sneak in properly, so just stay here a minute - "

Peggy beams, only a little embarrassed to be in her robe in front of company. "Joanie! Walt! I'm so glad you could come."

"Wouldn't miss it" Walt says with a bashful, loving smile. "I, uh, I had an idea for the ceremony. If you want."

"What is it?"

"We're going to do it on the beach, right?" She nods. "Well maybe I can make a nice little design out of some shells or stones or something for you to stand inside? Like we used to do with the white rocks at the 4077?"

She's not sure what he's talking about with the rocks, but behind him, Joan is nodding pointedly at Peggy, so she says "Of course, Walter, that sounds lovely."

He turns heel and trots toward the water and Joan comes in with their suitcases. "Peggy, my dear. It's so good to see you."

Walter comes back up to the house as Joan and Peggy finish getting ready. "Peggy?" he calls through the house. 

"What is it, Walt?" 

"Uh, listen, when you come down to the beach, leave straight off the front of the porch, ok? Just walk down in a straight line to where you see me on the sand."

"I think I was planning to walk in straight line all along, Walt."

"Ok, I just wanted to make sure. It's part of the plan. See ya!"

They hear him hustle out the door. Peg finishes her lipstick and looks over at Joan, who's putting her hair up in a tidy bun. "What was that about?"

Joan shrugs. "You know how he is. Gets a picture in his head of how something should go and needs to make sure everyone plays their part. You look perfect, Peg. Absolutely splendid. I'm going to head down now, and I'll let them know you're coming."

Peggy opens the drawer and pulls out the envelope, folding it as small as she can make it in her hand. Then she takes a sip of water and leaves by the front door, just as Radar instructed. She sees him down on the sand and gives a wave. He waves back, but holds his hands up to stop her. She waits as he puts two fingers in his mouth and lets out a whistle, and then motions for her to come.

As she walks down, it suddenly comes together - she's coming from the front, and Hawkeye and BJ are each coming in from one side of the beach. Different directions, coming to converge. She's grinning, eyes brimming as she watches them stride through the sand to where Walter and Joan stand. 

As she reaches the sand, she starts to head toward the water, but immediately stumbles as her heels sink with every step. Oh, hell she thinks, bending down and unbuckling them before kicking them off to the side. BJ and Hawkeye are already waiting for her, laughing. She looks up and each of them holds out an arm.

Peggy breaks into a run.

When she reaches them, she sees the stones and shells that Radar has laid down. They are in three interlocking circles; BJ in one, Hawkeye in another. She steps into the third, and they envelop her in their arms, kissing her cheeks. 

There are no dry eyes.

"Are there things to say?" Walter finally asks. 

"I've got a little something," BJ says, stepping back from the knot of them and fishing in his pockets. He pulls out a piece of paper and begins to read.

"Hawkeye," he begins, his voice catching and choking on the name. "I have no words for what it means that you have become part of our family. Grateful, joyful, amazed - they're all too small for what this is. And Peggy - my beloved Peggy Jane - there aren't words either for what it means that you opened the gate on our love and brought him in."

There's a small whimper outside the circle and a soft hush. Joan is openly weeping, Walt's arm around her, lips pressed to her head. "Go on," he mouths at them. "She's okay."

"The longer we're together," BJ continues, his voice cracking on every phrase, "the more foolish it seems that we were ever apart. That we ever felt whole. I've known a lot of lonely people in my life, and I've always counted friendship and love as my greatest blessings. And you two - " he stops to blow his nose and wipe his eyes - "you two are among those miracles. Erin, of course, being the greatest."

"Amen," says Hawkeye.

"I wish she could be here," BJ continues. "And I know I'm not alone in looking forward to the day when we can sit her down and tell her the whole grand story of how her family - how her parents - came to be. How it was only ever love that mattered. Benjamin Franklin Pierce, I am so grateful - I am so honored - to call you mine. And Margaret Jane Hayden Hunnicutt, I am so grateful, and so honored, to call myself yours."

Hawkeye looks to Radar and gestures for him to hand him something. Radar produces a small leatherbound Bible, clearly worn. Hawkeye turns it over in his hands, then opens it to show them the inside of the cover. On the left is the Hippocratic Oath. On the right is a list of names - all Pierces - dating back to the 1800s. 

"This is our family bible," he says. "Pierces have been doctors since the first time someone threw a pile of leeches at Hiram Pierce in the middle of the war of 1812." Everyone chuckles.

"The tradition is," Hawkeye continues, "that -" he stops, eyes welling. He barely gets the next words out. "That your father or your uncle inscribes your name when you finish medical school and begin your life as a doctor." Peggy looks closer, and sure enough, the last name - only a few inches from the bottom - reads "Benjamin Franklin H. Pierce."

"And then - " he gasps a little to catch his breath and steady his voice. "And then, if you get married" - he points to a second column of names, matched with the first, with a few gaps, "Your wife's name goes next to yours."

He pulls a pen out of his pocket and hands them to Peggy. "You've got that perfect schoolteacher script," he says with a hint of teasing. "It'd be better for you to write it than a coupla doctors." They laugh and Peg takes the pen. 

"Hawkeye?" she asks. "They're all Pierces. And we're - "

"Put us down as Pierces," BJ cuts in. "Doesn't matter if this is the only place it's ever written. In the Pierce family bible, we're Pierces."

She looks to Hawkeye, who nods with a hand over his mouth. "If you're alright with it," he whispers. 

She blows him a kiss and gets to writing.

Finally, it's Peggy's turn. She unfolds the envelope and turns away as she tugs the contents out, passing the envelope off to Joan.

"Hawkeye," she says. "Loving you is one of the hardest things I've ever done. Not because you're not lovable!" she exclaims, suddenly aware of how she sounds. Hawk smirks and BJ chuckles, but they both nod at her to go on, with understanding.

"Learning of BJ's love for you, and yours for him forced me to rebuild my entire understanding of the world and my place in it. And -" now it's her turn for her voice to break. "And my world is so much bigger. And so much brighter. And where I was once afraid there would be no place for me, I now marvel at how small my place was before you came."

Hawkeye holds her gaze and smiles, blowing her a kiss. 

"I've long said that BJ is our sunshine - our bright star. Isn't that right?" Hawk nods and BJ blushes. She turns to BJ. "And he's the moon - reflecting all our love back to us and -" she winks "rising the tides ere he goes." The same thought occurs to them all at once - and, it seems, to Joan and Walt, too, who both promptly blush to their ears.

"And me, I've always felt like the earth. Not between you, but the keeper of the oceans and, well - " she puts a hand on her stomach -"the one who can grow things." That gets guffaws from Joan.

"Anyway - actually, Joan, Walt, can you step in a little bit? I want you here for this. I want you to know that as wonderful as it is to have the kind of love that we share, it makes so much difference - all the difference - that we can share it with you," she says through her tears, voice shaking. "It means so much that you've opened your hearts to us."

Joan touches her heart and points to Peggy's. 

"And I wish - more than anything - that we could share our love with the rest of the world the way we can share it with you. And for me, this is how I'd like it."

She opens her hand and plucks Daniel's wedding band out, holding it out to Hawkeye. "Benjamin Franklin Pierce, will you take this ring and be mine and ours until we die?"

He gasps. "Oh, Peg." She smiles to herself - he really had forgotten.

"Peggy, oh Peggy, you angel. Yes. Of course yes. Always yes." He holds his hand out and she slides the band onto his finger.

"And BJ, you're not left out," she says. "I had one made for you to match."

He can't disguise the surprise - touched and affectionate and momentarily how-much-did-that-cost. She giggles. "It pays to have friends who are also girls who work," she says. "You wouldn't believe the employee discounts at some of those stores." His face relaxes into a beam as he holds his hand out. She slides it on top of his other band. 

Finally, she takes Adelaide's engagement ring and holds it up. With the new fittings and cleaning, it looks both ancient and new. Timeless. "I don't think I can get away with wearing this on my finger all the time," she says. "But I will today. And on the other days - " she slips a finger under the collar of her dress and pulls out Adelaide's emerald necklace on the gold chain - "will this suffice?"

Hawkeye staggers toward her and pulls her close, kissing her hard and crying harder.

Peg surrenders to it, slick and tear streaked. As soon as they stop to breathe, she looks him in the eye and tilts her head toward BJ. That's all it takes. Hawkeye cups a hand around the back of BJ's head and leans in, but BJ deftly slips an arm around Hawkeye's back and dips him for all he's worth. Hawk nearly kicks Peggy in the chin and no one knows whether to laugh or sigh, so they do both. 

Finally, BJ comes for Peg, and their kiss is nothing like it was on their own wedding day. There's no hesitation. No butterflies. Just solidity and warmth.

Hawkeye wraps his arms around their shoulders, and the three of them press their heads together in the center, eyes closed, not saying anything.

Just the waves. And the wind. And the three stone rings at their feet.


	8. The one smutty chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter falls in the time between Hawk coming home / the jewelry scene and the wedding.

For the first few nights, Hawk barely wants to be touched. He's drained, exhausted, sleep claiming him as soon as he hits the mattress. He sleeps more solidly in that week than Peg's ever seen. No nightmares. So it surprises her a little when she wakes up one morning, so early it's still dark, and she can tell he's awake by the way he's breathing. And by how stiff he is at her back.

She sidles herself up against him, bringing his arm over her and his hand lands between her breasts, cupped and gentle, his thumb stroking her nipple through her nightgown. Peg sighs and arches just a little, finding a delicious ache in her muscles. If this is real - if he's ready, if he wants her - she'll show him what she missed.

She hears him take a long breath, pushing his hips against her just a little, his other arm slipping under her neck for her to rest on. He caresses her cheek and she turns her head. Takes one of his fingers in her mouth and gives it a long, drawn-out pull. He groans from somewhere deep and slips another one in.

A rustling from the other side of the bed tells them that they're not alone in their waking. She hears him roll over, feels his fingertips on her hip as he reaches over Hawkeye to hold them both. "What have we here?" BJ says, voice sleepsoaked and amused. "Wake-up's in an hour." Peggy and Hawkeye shush him in unison. "Can I play?" BJ rumbles, slipping his hand between them and giving Hawk a squeeze.

Hawk sighs deeply and answers, "mhmm" like he's distracted. They stay like that for some time - rocking their bodies in close, small movements, a hand here, a finger there, a well-placed kiss. Peggy knows he needs this - the reconnecting, the coming home, even though they've been together for days.

Hawk slides a slow hand from her knee up the inside of her thigh and Peggy wants his touch so badly a tiny whine escapes her, a small, high sound that provokes a growl from both of them.

"Miss me?" Hawk says, fingers roving over her thigh, her hip, her lower belly, teasing her curls - everything but what she needs.

"Gd yes," she says. "Please, Hawkeye - " He kisses her neck, nips at her ear to hear her gasp.

"I love it when you say please." Peggy rolls over to face him and slides her leg over two pairs of hips. Now he'll have to give her what she wants - she's pinned his hand in exactly the right spot. But Hawkeye doesn't budge, rests his hand on her leg and smirks so hard she can feel it when they kiss.

"You're rotten," she murmurs.

"Isn't he?" BJ says.

"He deserves to be punished for leading a girl on," Peg teases.

"What do you think we should do?" BJ's voice is all innocence, but she can see his hand coming around Hawk's face and slipping two fingers into Hawkeye's mouth. Hawk moans with his mouth full, and she can tell it's working, that he's going to that slightly delirious, obedient, deep, soft place in his mind.

Love him," Peg answers, unable to keep the game going - it's too much, not right after a funeral, when they haven't made love in weeks.

"My thoughts exactly," BJ says, pulling his fingers out of Hawkeye's mouth. "You want to go first or should I?"

"Me," Peg says decisively - maybe even a little possessively - as she makes her way down Hawkeye's body, shedding her nightclothes as she goes. She gestures to them to move up the bed so she doesn't have to get to the floor. BJ loves it when she's naked while he's still got clothes on - maybe Hawk will, too. She frees his cock and moves in, slow, easy, her tongue teasing out all the most sensitive spots of the head, feeling him twitch and groan. She looks up and sees BJ sitting behind him, Hawk leaning against his chest, arching into her mouth with a gentle hand worked into her curls.

 _"_ He needs this," BJ says, idly unbuttoning Hawk's pajama top to tease a nipple. "We didn't do anything in Maine."

"Yeah, sleeping in the bed of one's recently deceased dad might have had something to do with that," Hawkeye says. "Oh, _Peg_. That's so good. Please don't stop. _Please_ don't stop." Peg hums around his cock and she can tell it's taking him every ounce of control not to shove into her throat.

After an eternity of teasing him, Peggy's squirming against the sheets herself. Hawk's got his eyes closed, ripples and shudders running through him, turning him wordless, open, drinking in whatever she gives him. BJ's hands run lazily over his skin and she can imagine how hard he is at Hawk's back. She climbs up to straddle him, sinking down slowly, enjoying the sensation of being full but not stretched. Hawk arches into her, hands scrabbling for sheets until BJ grabs both his hands, weaves their finger together, and holds them down. Hawk's mouth opens, lips moving like he's trying to speak and the words just don't come.

Peggy recognizes the shape of his "please," and shudders. The light is coming in now, and she can see BJ's eyes, dark and wanting, his chin hooked over Hawk's shoulder.

"Peg," he says, voice thick and lustful. "Let me see it." She's too worked up to give them much of a show, rocking her hips up and down, fingers circling tight, focused. She can feel the oncoming orgasm like sunrise, the deep, rising glow she can sense over the next hill.

Now Hawkeye _does_ say "Please. Please, Peggy, please - " and she's about to tell him yes when BJ growls "Not until she's finished, and not even then. I haven't had my turn."

Hawk can feel Peggy's orgasm in the split second before she does, the way she tightens around him, pauses for a second - la petite mort, the perfect name as she stills, thighs flexed and strong, and then she's curling over, breathing hard and fast and shuddery. If the light were better, he'd see the blush on her chest.

BJ lets go of his hands, and he pulls her close, wraps her tight in his arms, kissing her head, her lips when she tilts her face up to him. "So good, Peggy Jane," he says softly.

Peggy straightens her legs and rolls to the side, groaning. "BJ?" she says groggily. "Is it your turn?"

BJ gives her a wicked grin. "Depends. Are you watching?" She nods, eyes half closed, but she needs this, too.

"Beej?"

"Yeah, Hawk."

"I don't know what you had in mind, but I need - I need something deeper."

"Mmmm," BJ purrs against his back. "Something deeper, like something deeper inside you?"

Hawk nods with a long sigh. "You know what I want."

"I do believe I do. Roll over, my good man."

Peg shifts to cradle Hawkeye's head and neck as he slowly rolls over, tucking his knees under him. She weaves her fingers through his hair, humming tunelessly and crooning as BJ grabs supplies. Hawk grunts softly into the side of her breast as BJ's fingers find him; she moans with a kind of sympathy.

When BJ finally snaps the gloves off and mounts him, Hawk rocks his hips back, burying his face in the blankets and calling muffled "yes, yes, oh _fuck_ " yeses into the mattress. BJ moves slow, steady, in fractions of movement, one hand reaching to grasp the scruff of Hawk's neck.

Peggy rolls onto her side for a better view. After the months of feeling jealousy flicker, blinding whatever else might've been there, she can appreciate this, finally. The beauty of their knowing. Their wordless language. They are always quieter than she thinks they'll be, when it's like this - a relic of the beginning. Hawk's breathing moves into stutters and gasps as BJ gets deeper, driving his hips down into the bed. Peg reaches under the bed and pulls out her box of summer nightgowns, grabs one that feels silky and stuffs it under his hips. Hawkeye swears as he strokes himself against the material in time with BJ's thrusts.

Then - she doesn't know if BJ changes the angle, or if he's finally got the right pace, or what - something shifts gears and Hawk starts shaking, hands scrabbling, taking the pillow and stuffing it under his chest so his face isn't right against the sheets. BJ rubs a hand down his back , doesn't let up, and Hawk comes apart, his cock nestled in the silky nest beneath him.

BJ comes to a stop, rubbing Hawkeye's hip in a cross between petting and massaging.

"You want me out?" he asks. Hawk shakes his head.

"No," he breathes. "Want you. Fill me up."

Some part of Peg clenches with want, a part that had gone previously undetected or unidentified. "Yesss," she says, languid and aroused. "Give him what he wants, BJ." She cups Hawk's cheek and makes him look up at her. "I know how it feels - well, sort of - and it's a good feeling," she says with a wink. He winks back.

Okay," BJ says, "But I want you on your back, Hawk." He pulls out slowly, wringing a delicious whimper from Hawkeye, who scrambles to flip himself over the second he's out. BJ pushes Hawk's knees to his chest and starts again, and Peg reverts to her old trick of muffling Hawkeye by sticking her fingers in his mouth.

Fingers that, at this moment, taste a lot like her.

She hasn't seen them do this very often - maybe twice in their years together - but the intimacy of it stuns her again. Hawk wraps his legs around BJ's hips, just as she's done; Hawk moves his head away from her fingers so they can kiss, and she thinks she'd like a record of the sounds Hawk spills into her mouth every time BJ moves.

It doesn't take him long before the thrusts get faster, more erratic, and then it's BJ who bites back a roar, and Hawk's head thrown back as BJ comes.

 

Peg grins in recognition. BJ wraps the towel around Hawk's hips as they come close together, pointedly ignoring the angle of the sun, sharing kisses and caresses.

 

Hawkeye buries his nose into Peg's armpit, and she pulls away, embarrassed, but he pulls her closer instead, taking a deep breath. "You smell like home," he explains. "You smell like a theater right before the show." BJ looks at her quizzically and she shakes her head. She'll explain it to him later.

 


End file.
